Movendi International, a global network for development through alcohol prevention has urged accredited non-State actors in health who wished to make statement at WHO Regional Committee for Africa to submit request to its Africa Regional Office. The request should be forwarded to the External Relations, Partnerships and Governing Bodies Unit of the WHO Regional Office for Africa at the e-mail address: [email protected] not later than one week before the start date of a session. A statement from the Movendi International and copied to the Ghana News Agency said the directive was in accordance with Paragraph 15 of the Annex of the Document AFR/RC71/2. It said the name and acronym of the accredited non-State actor should be written or oral in English, French or Portuguese and should respect the time and word limits set for statements for the relevant session, as specified in the information note disseminated. It stated that the statement being submitted to the WHO Regional Committee should focus on technica l issues and should be directly relevant to both the agenda item and to the document prepared for the item. 'The statement should not raise issues of a political nature that are unrelated to the agenda item and should not contain any inappropriate or offensive reference to Member States,' Movendi said. It stated that: 'While there should be no reference to any individual Member State or areas of Member States, it is recalled that nomenclature must follow that of the United Nations.' Movendi said: 'The Chairperson of the Regional Committee decides whether or not to accord the accredited non-State actors the right to make its oral statement during the session in light of its relevance to the discussion, the time constraints or any other reason.' The statement is posted on the website of the WHO Regional Office for Africa for a limited time as determined by the Secretariat and will not be retained thereafter. Source: Ghana News Agency